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Sam DeMarco III, At Large Council Representative, sits in a city council meeting inside the Allegheny County Courthouse on Tuesday, Oct. 8, 2024, in Downtown. Mr. DeMarco is stepping down from council Tuesday night to join Sen. Dave McCormick's team.
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Sam DeMarco reflects on time leading local GOP and Allegheny County Council

Benjamin B. Braun/Post-Gazette

Sam DeMarco reflects on time leading local GOP and Allegheny County Council

The North Fayette councilman is stepping down to join Sen. Dave McCormick’s team

When Sam DeMarco was in his opening years as an at-large County Councilman, he didn’t have any plans to lead the county’s GOP committee.

But then, in 2019, multiple local Republicans started reaching out to him. They said he would be a good chairman, based on his work on council and vision for the party.

Mr. DeMarco only planned on serving out the remainder term of his predecessor (D. Raja), about a year. Juggling a full-time job, the council seat, and being chairman was considerable work, Mr. DeMarco said.

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But as the 66-year-old from North Fayette started the job, he realized he could take local Republicans in a new direction, focusing on local and state races and recruiting quality candidates to run. Mr. DeMarco said that “through the curse of competency,” staying on as leader of the county party just made sense in many ways.

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“Folks came to me and asked me to please step in because they didn't believe that the folks that were currently in the [chairman] race were able to look at this from a strategic standpoint, or the big picture,” Mr. DeMarco said. “They were more focused on things like tactics.”

More than five years after he was elected chairman — and over nine years since he first won an at-large seat on council — Mr. DeMarco is stepping down from both roles to serve as southwestern Pennsylvania regional director in newly seated Sen. Dave McCormick’s office. Tuesday is his last County Council meeting.

In a lengthy interview with the Post-Gazette, he talked about his time in both positions and current issues facing the Republican Party. Questions and answers have been edited for length and clarity.

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Q. Why is now the time to step down as local leader of the GOP?

A. I had the opportunity to meet Sen. McCormick over four years ago when he first ran for office, and I was impressed with how dynamic of a leader he was then. And I believe that he can truly be a transformative senator here for the people of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and the opportunity to play even a small part in that is just something that I couldn't pass up.

Q. When you look at your time on County Council, what are you most proud of, legislatively or policywise?

A. The recent initiative I led, where we distributed funds for body-worn cameras to municipal police departments throughout Allegheny County that didn't have the money to provide them on their own. It is something that was very important to me.

To me, body worn cameras play a critical role [in police stops]. Number one, the fact that the officer is wearing them provides a video record of the actual interaction. Two, when you have that video, he tells the person that he's interacting with that hey, you know you're on video here, I believe they can help defuse some situations and prevent them from getting out of control. Three, it's a way for police chiefs to actually train their officers, because they can't be with them all the time, but they have the opportunity to review the footage and be able to hope to coach and counsel officers on like, well, here's how you would handle that stop, or here's what I might have done differently.

Q. What is the state of the local GOP, both at the county and state level?

A. I would say that the state of the state legislature is different than it was. We have less people in office, but a lot of that's due to redistricting … that eliminated a number of [Republican] seats. Like Carrie DelRosso [former state representative who served District 33], her district, you know, she was redistricted out. Lori Mizgorski [former state representative in District 30], her district was basically redistricted out.

I think a large factor [on County Council] that applies to the fact that Act 77 [a state law that expanded mail-in voting] and the mail-in ballots came into being. It was back in 2017 when Ed Kress lost to Anita Prizio, but that was the first election after Trump had won in 2016. And Democrats were fired up across the country, coming out like hornets.

Q. How shocking was that loss to Ms. Prizio? [Prizio represents District 3, which includes Millvale, Etna, and Sharpsburg, and stretches to Fox Chapel, Indiana, Hampton, and West Deer]

A. It was shocking. I don’t want to throw stones at Ed Kress, Ed’s a friend. But he didn’t work hard. I mean, Tom Baker [in District 1] and he were running at the same time. And Baker was knocking on doors like crazy. I mean, he knocked on thousands of doors. Ed Kress wasn't. He thought, just by going to see the police [at events], or showing up at different things, or given that he had union support, that that was going to get him across the finish line, and he ended up losing by like around 300 votes. And Baker ended up winning by like 100 votes.

Q. A lot of people mention your ability to fundraise for local races. What does that come down to?

A. I think it comes down to commitment and trust. Look, I'm a workhorse, not a show horse. And by that, I throw myself into these things, and I believe that when I go on to donors asking for their help and support, they see the commitment that I've made. They know that I'm out there working and doing what needs to be done, and it's their belief in me that has allowed me to raise money.

Q. Where do you view yourself in the Republican Party, both locally and nationally? And from an ideological perspective?

A. I'm just a little guy that was just trying to make my little part of the world a better place. If you asked me, you know, what did I hope? I would hope that I left Allegheny County just a little bit of a better place than it was when I found it, working constructively to advance economic development projects, working constructively to try to promote business and investment.

I'm a conservative, but I'm what I would call a pragmatic conservative. I believe in conservative fiscal policy. In regards to social issues, look, I don't care who somebody loves, that's up to them. I don't care what you do in your own home. That's up to you. I do have a problem with men in women’s and girls’ locker rooms and bathrooms. I do have a problem with the mutilation of juveniles, you know, with these gender transitions.

There's a test out there where you can test to see yourself where you fit, on a scale. I mean, I'm almost like a libertarian in some ways. You know, I believe that government is best when it's small, that it tends to get in the way much more than it helps, and that it spends people's money ineffectively.

Q. What are the largest challenges for local Republicans, other than the roughly two-to-one edge in Democratic to GOP voter registration countywide?

A. One of the problems that people have with Republicans is they claim that they make all these promises during a campaign, but then they get into office and they don't deliver on them, whereas progressives tend to deliver on their promises, as disastrous as those promises turn out to be.

I think one of the most effective campaign models in the past has been, promises made, promises kept. People vote for you because of what you're telling them you're going to do. Well, damn it, you owe it to them to try to get that done.

The other thing is, and some people do, but the majority of folks don't send you there to fight. They send you there to get things done on their behalf. So you have to find common ground with people, and find ways for you to get a win that can make the lives of your constituents better.

Q. How do you expect to serve southwestern Pennsylvania in this new role in Sen. McCormick’s office?

A. I believe that the network of folks that I've built up in my service on County Council and as party chair, the credibility I've built with these people by being, in many cases, an honest broker, somebody that if I tell them something they know I will keep my word, that's helped me develop relationships. Which I believe will help me help the senator effect change here quicker than otherwise might be possible.

I was very proud to have gone to the White House under President Trump in his first term, during the executive order signing creating the White House Opportunity Zone and Revitalization Council. I believe that those are opportunities for us to be able to encourage private investment in some of the more distressed areas here in the county and in the region, to try to help the folks that are here. And it's something that I don't believe there's been a focus on previously, from an economic development perspective, and I'm excited about talking to the elected officials in the counties here in southwestern Pennsylvania to understand, what are their priorities, what are they looking for?

First Published: January 14, 2025, 10:30 a.m.
Updated: January 15, 2025, 1:49 p.m.

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Sam DeMarco III, At Large Council Representative, sits in a city council meeting inside the Allegheny County Courthouse on Tuesday, Oct. 8, 2024, in Downtown. Mr. DeMarco is stepping down from council Tuesday night to join Sen. Dave McCormick's team.  (Benjamin B. Braun/Post-Gazette)
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